Leafs Bounce Back Thanks to a Bad Bounce (Canadiens)

Canadiens

Leafs Bounce Back Thanks to a Bad Bounce

By Karine Hains

Feb 24, 2019 • 5:59 pm

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Watching your favourite team is always great entertainment but through a season, there will be some highs and some lows…In some cases, like last night, you’ll even experience incredible highs and crushing lows in the very same game. Things started just fine for Claude Julien’s team even though they were missing one of their top 6 forward, Jonathan Drouin having been scratched because of a virus. The Tricolore came rushing out of the gates in the first period and quite simply shelled Frederik Andersen’s net with shots, dominated in the face-off circle and had more hits than their nemesis. Just passed the 8 minutes mark, Andrew Shaw managed to control a rebound and push it behind the Leafs’ goalie to put the Habs up ahead by one. Babcock felt that there had been goaltender interference on that play and decided to use his coach’s challenge, but he was unsuccessful. It was quite clear from the replay that the contact on the play was initiated by Andersen himself and not by Shaw. There was a time when a challenge featuring Shaw meant that a goal would be taken away (I bet Victor Mete remembers that quite clearly) but on that occasion, the Mutt stayed out of the blue paint and did everything right. Seems to me that Shaw is taking a bigger and bigger role on this team and handling it very well indeed. The Canadiens doubled their lead when Tomas Tatar scored his 21st of the season off a Jeff Petry pass that found him all alone on the left side. Less than a minute later, it was Petry’s turn to bury one with a hard shot from around the face-off dot in the Leafs’ zone. That one was scored on the power play, 28 seconds into the Canadiens’ first of three power play opportunities in the first period. At the end of 20 minutes, the Canadiens had 20 shots to the Leafs’ 10, had won 56.5% of the faceoffs and were just dominant. On social media, Habs fans were ecstatic and already counting their chicken as they say.

Less than a minute into the second frame, Victor Mete (who was playing his 100th career game in front of over 30 members of his family and friends) took a holding call and the Maple Leafs did not fail to capitalize on that opportunity. Auston Matthews put a shot right through Carey Price’s five-hole to put Toronto on the board. All through the period, the local team seemed so much more energized than the visitors, they looked like a confident team who knew that it wasn’t in trouble even though they were still 2 goals down. At 16:19, Artturi Lehkonen received 2 minutes for goaltender interference (that was a questionable call to say the least) and once more, the Leafs scored with the man advantage. After 40 minutes, the Habs had 31 shots and the Leafs 25 (in other words 15 to 11 during the second frame for Toronto).

To Habs fans’ dismay, the third started much in the same fashion. Montreal was playing on its heels and it just felt like it was only a matter of time before the lead was no more. Just over the 6 minutes mark, Carey Price came out of his net to play the puck like he does numerous times a game but through a cruel twist of fate, the puck took a bad bounce off the boards and William Nylander was able to score the easiest goal of his career to tie things up at 3. To be fair though, even without this freaky bounce, the Leafs would have won the game. They were dominated for 20 minutes but they adjusted prior to the 2nd period and took over the final 40 minutes of play. All through the third, they carried on attacking while the Habs were merely trying to stay alive. Toronto put the puck on net 11 times in the 3rd while the Canadiens only tested Andersen 4 times. There were less than two minutes to play when Hyman put the Leafs up ahead by one and as desperate times call for desperate measures, Julien pulled his goalie. While playing 6 on 5, the Bleu, Blanc, Rouge failed to take a single shot on goal, would have been somewhat of a miracle to be able to score. In the end, Toronto put the puck in the empty net twice and skated away with a 6-3 win…Needless to say the first period was quite enjoyable for Habs nation, but the last 40 minutes was the stuff of nightmare.

Last night made it quite clear that while the Habs’ “reset… is heading in the right direction (based on the whole season so far) it is by no means near complete. This group is young and there’s plenty of room for improvement which will not happen overnight. Thankfully, the Flyers managed to beat the Penguins in overtime last night which prevented Pittsburgh from overtaking the Habs in 7th place. Meanwhile, the Hurricanes also put another on in the win column and leapfrogged the Pens in 8th place. Montreal, Carolina and Pittsburgh have now all played 62 games and the Habs have a single point lead on the other two teams. Right now, according to Sportsclubstats, Montreal has a 69.3% chance to make the playoffs down 10% following that loss in TO. Nothing is guaranteed yet and the Canadiens need to take charge of their destiny by playing complete games and banking all the points they can get. Ideally, they’ll want to hang on to the 7th rank, who would want to face Tampa Bay in the first round? As for Toronto, they’ve showed yesterday that they are the better of the two teams. They are no Lightning mind you, but they are solid enough to dominate the Canadiens. There’s no denying that they have a lot of speed, skill and talent but that didn’t happen overnight. They went through quite a few very dark years to get to this point and if Habs fans are patient, they’ll see Kotkaniemi blossom, Poehling jump on the big stage, the blue line receive some much-needed reinforcement and then, the Leafs will see that Montreal can give them a run for their money.

In the meantime, as the trade deadline looms and Marc Bergevin went to spy on the Rangers and Devils yesterday, I hope he resists the temptation of making unnecessary moves. It’s even clearer now that the Canadiens aren’t contenders and it’s not a few desperate moves that will make them into one. Of course, a Mason/Armia type cap dump deal could be possible, but you’ll need a team to be in quite the pickle to receive something worth giving them a hand. The Getzlaf/Perry possibilities are being discussed on Twitter but unless a great young left d-man (Lindholm or Fowler) makes his way to Montreal and the price is reasonable, I see no reason to help the competition. In a little over 24 hours, we’ll know who’s going to finish the season with the Sainte-Flanelle and I really wish for Hudon that Bergevin will manage to trade him. When Drouin had to withdraw from yesterday’s tilt and Julien decided to dress Deslauriers and not Hudon, it spoke volumes about how he feels about the former Saguenéen. The Canadiens needed firepower to compete with the Leafs and clearly Julien though that’s not something Hudon could provide. In the end, Deslauriers played just over 10 minutes last night and had one hit to show for it…at least he wasn’t on the ice for any of the Leafs’ goals though. The Habs will hit the ice again tomorrow night in New Jersey and it will be interesting to see who will man the net since they’ll then face Detroit on Tuesday. In the meantime, enjoy the trade deadline specials tomorrow and we’ll see if Bergevin decides to stay on the sidelines or jump right in.

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